Westport (Grays Harbor Series Book 1)

by James Bierce

  "Did you live around here? You know, before...?"

  "No, we lived in Portland. We came here to get away from everyone."

  "Was it bad there too?"

  "Like this? I don't know. There was a lot of looting and destruction going on. People were burning cars and houses, and it didn't do any good to call the cops. We were the last ones to leave our neighborhood."

  "We were on our way to Astoria, although I'm not really sure why anymore. It just seemed like the place to be."

  "We drove through there on our way up the coast, but that was before everything really went to hell."

  "There's no way we're getting there now, not without a boat. Its probably just as well anyway though."

  "Yeah, I'd imagine those things are everywhere by now."

  "Things?"

  "The people that lived. Whatever they are, I don't think they're human anymore."

  "What does that make us?"

  "Lucky I guess."

  Larry had never thought of himself as being 'lucky'. After losing his wife to the illness, becoming suicidal because of it, then becoming separated from the only two people that he knows in the world — that's the last description he'd ever use for himself. All things considered, however, he might be right. He woke up this morning on a beach surrounded by the bodies of those who weren't so fortunate.

  "How far is it from here to the city?" he asks Curtis.

  "The bridge is only a mile or so up the highway. Downtown is right on the other side."

  Both of them stare out the window, watching as the fog rolls in from the entrance of harbor and over the town of Westport in the distance. Little by little the buildings of Aberdeen across the water begin to disappear into the darkness and haze, and then a faint white light appears on the hill right behind the town.

  "Do you see that light?" asks Larry.

  "Yeah, I thought I was seeing things."

  Ben can't imagine a worse pain than the way his feet are feeling at the moment. This is the third straight day he's been walking, and the only sleep he got last night was for a brief time at the Regency Hotel with his parents.

  The past twenty-four hours have been a roller coaster of emotions for the ten-year-old boy. After being separated from his family, Amanda became his savior, rescuing him from certain death at the hands of an angry mob of people outside the hotel. She was kind to him, giving him shelter from both the people and the weather outside — but even in those early moments of kindness, something seemed off, something that he couldn't quite figure out until early this morning. At first he thought she might be sick like the others, that she'd lost her mind somehow — but she didn't seem to have any of the other physical symptoms that he'd seen in all of the other people in town. It was when they started walking through the woods that he really knew something was wrong — that was when he first heard her conversations with Aaron, her older brother. She was carrying on both sides of an angry argument while standing in the middle of the trail — her eyes glazed over and unfocused, and her hands shaking slightly. Even then, however, part of him was glad that she was with him. He felt safe around her, safe from the 'scourge' that she seemed to know so much about.

  Earlier this evening, that all changed. He'd noticed two people following them earlier in the day as they walked along the shore of the harbor, both of them walking down the middle of the highway without a care in the world as to who saw them. Amanda told him that there was obviously something wrong with them, and that walking along the rocky beach was clearly the safest route to Aberdeen, despite the bodies and filth that lined the shore. A few hours later, as the sun began to set into the west, he could see without question that one of the men was his father. In any normal circumstance he would've blurted out his excitement to her, but with every passing minute his fear of her was growing — he'd seen her do things to people, full-grown adults, that made him sick to his stomach. She didn't just kill them, she enjoyed it.

  Its now dark outside, and he has his eyes closed, pretending to be asleep on a stranger's couch while his travel companion watches something outside that she clearly doesn't want him to see. He knows that its his dad that she's watching, and that he's staying somewhere nearby — the only problem is finding him without Amanda knowing about it.

  He opens his eyes just a slit, unsure of whether or not she can see him in the subdued lighting of the living room. She's about twenty feet away, still sitting in front of the dining room window, her stained and tattered white dress outlined by the faint moonlight coming through the glass. He waits a few minutes for his eyes to fully adjust to the darkness, then quietly swings his legs off of the couch and stands up. After a quick glance in Amanda's direction to make sure she didn't hear him, he sneaks across the room and into the kitchen, where he can barely make out the back door on the far wall. His shoes, still wet from the mud and rain earlier in the evening, squeak slightly on the linoleum floor as he crosses it. When he hears the sound of a chair being moved in the other room, followed by footsteps in his direction, he runs to the door and tries to open it, forgetting that she'd locked it when they arrived. As he fumbles with the deadbolt, finally managing to get it turned, he suddenly gets the feeling that he's not alone.

  "What are you doing?" he hears Amanda say from behind him, her voice angry. "Get back in bed."

  He considers responding to her, not knowing if he should simply lie and tell her he had to go to the bathroom. Something deep inside tells him otherwise though, that he needs to get as far away from her as humanly possible. He slowly takes his hand away from the lock and onto the handle, his entire body trembling from fear.

  "Don't do it..." she warns him.

  Ignoring her, he turns the handle and runs out into the wind and rain, closing the door behind him. As soon as he steps off of the wooden deck and onto the ground below, he slips and falls onto the muddy ground. He can hear the door open as he gets up and keeps running, eventually making his way onto the gravel driveway beside the house. The area in front of him is wide-open, making him an easy target for Amanda to spot — and then he sees a small woodshed on the side of the neighboring house, the inside of which is hidden from the dim glow of the night sky.

  He ducks inside the shed and wedges himself into the far corner, then realizes that there's only one way in or out of the place. Just as he considers moving, he sees the beam coming from Amanda's flashlight on the driveway. She's walking slowly, the gravel crunching lightly under her feet, the light aimed only a couple of feet in front of her. At first Ben can't figure out what she's doing, and then he realizes — she's looking for footprints. She walks about ten feet down the driveway, and then stops, shining the light around her. He hopes that the rain has washed away any trace of his prints, but then he notices the wet and muddy marks left on the entrance of the shed. As she shines her light all around the area, he holds his breath as the beam comes into the shed and lands right over his head — but then it moves away after only a few seconds, and she begins to slowly walk farther down the driveway toward the highway.

  Peeking out from the doorway, Ben waits until she turns and walks toward the front of the house, then he exits the shed and runs in the opposite direction, toward a car that's sitting in front of a gas station only a couple of doors down. When he makes it to the car, he crouches down behind it, trying to spot Amanda's light again — but he doesn't see it anywhere. As he reaches up for the door handle, he sees two figures walking down the highway in his direction. At first he ducks down out of sight, and then he begins to wonder if it might be his dad and whoever he's walking with. He stands up slowly, careful not to make his presence known just yet, but he can't quite tell exactly who they are. As they get closer, he watches their movements closely, trying to determine if they're walking like all of the other infected — but their gait looks normal as far as he can tell.

  He steps out onto the edge of the highway where they can easily spot him, and then waits for them to get closer. It doesn't take them long to begin walking directl
y toward him, and when they're only about ten feet away, Ben can hear the labored breathing and wheezing coming from both of them. By the time he sees their faces they're only a few feet away — and neither one of the men is his dad. He turns around, intending to run, but instead he feels a sharp pain in the back of his head, and then his eyesight fades away as he loses consciousness.

  For whatever reason, shock, denial, or otherwise, Matt hadn't given a lot of thought about the people outside, until tonight that is. Seeing the man next door changed the way he thought about them. He no longer saw them as some sort of monster or creature from a comic book or film — these people were much worse than that. Whatever made them this way also destroyed his life as he knew it, separating him from his father and siblings. Every time he comes near them, or touches anything they might have had contact with, he worries about catching their disease and becoming whatever it is that they are. Monsters aren't contagious, at least not any that he's ever read about.

  Earlier in the evening, after the cloud bank covered what little sun was still visible, some of the people started passing by the house again — only this time they were mostly traveling in the opposite direction as the night before. He and his mom had wondered why almost everyone was walking toward town, with only a few going against the tide. Tonight they came to the conclusion that there's no reason for anything that they do, they simply react to whatever is in front of them at the time.

  Whether due to the increased traffic earlier in the night, or possibly the heavy rain and wind that's coming in from the ocean once again, the numbers outside are down dramatically from yesterday — so much so that Matt is having a hard time staying awake. He keeps coming up with new ideas to stay alert, like naming the other students in his class, or reciting the impossibly long list of rules that his father had written for them at the cabin. Sleep, however, seems inevitable — and shortly after midnight, Matt's eyes begin to close, leaving his mind in a state somewhere between reality and the dreamworld. He hears something rhythmic in the background, still unsure of whether or not he's dreaming — and then suddenly he opens his eyes.

  Despite being fully conscious, the rhythmic sound is still there, this time clearly recognizable as footsteps coming from somewhere in the room. He can feel his mom sleeping next to him, and he can see Clara's dead body still propped up in the corner of the room — which only leaves the man in the other room. He reaches to his side and grabs the revolver, then lifts his head up, aiming the gun toward the footsteps. Just as his eyes start to adjust to the darkness of the room, he sees the silhouette of someone as they open the back door and step outside, slamming the door behind them.

  "What's going on?" Sarah asks, awoken by the closing door.

  "I must've fallen asleep for a few minutes."

  "Was someone in here with us?"

  Matt stands up and aims the gun at the door, then starts walking toward it. "Yeah, they just left." The house is creaking with every gust of wind that hits it, pelting the window with rain and pine needles, causing Matt to flinch every time it happens. When he finally reaches the door he quickly locks both the handle and the deadbolt, then backs up without looking behind the curtain, afraid of what he might see. "I know I locked this..."

  "You should check the front door, and make sure the guy down the hall is still there."

  He has to will himself across the floor toward the hallway — fear has taken control of almost every part of his body. He takes his flashlight out of his pocket and shines it down the hall, relieved to see that the door is still barricaded the same as before. Then it occurs to him — if it wasn't the man in the bedroom, then who was it? Still not wanting anybody to know that they're inside the house, he turns his light off again and proceeds through the kitchen and into the front room, half expecting to see someone else waiting there for him. All he finds, however, is another unlocked door.

  After locking the door and checking the house once again for any intruders, he sits down next to his mom on the couch, now wide-awake despite the minuscule amount of sleep he's gotten lately.

  "Did you figure out how they got in?" she asks him.

  "No, I checked all of the doors and windows last night."

  "We should both keep watch for a while, just until we know its safe..."

  Nearly an hour has passed by since the intrusion into their temporary home, and both Sarah and Matt are huddled together on the couch, frightened by every breaking tree branch or piece of debris that hits the side of the house. Every so often a flash of lightning illuminates the room for a brief second, followed quickly by the booming sound of thunder from overhead. Sarah is almost certain that on two occasions she spotted people walking by the window when the lightning hit, and she wonders what sort of psychosis would make somebody want to walk around in weather like this.

  "We need to get back to the cabin tomorrow, we can't keep living like this." Sarah whispers.

  "What about your leg?"

  "You'll need to find a car or something. There's bound to be one around here that we can take."

  "I don't know how to drive though..."

  "I'll show you, its not that hard. Some of the dumbest people I know are still capable of it." She looks over at him, hoping to see a smile on his face, but even in near darkness she can tell something is distracting him. "What is it?"

  "I thought I heard something."

  "Like what?"

  "A clicking."

  Immediately after the words come out of his mouth, they both hear a door shut in the front room, followed by a slow set of footsteps making their way into the kitchen. Sarah rolls off of the couch and onto the floor, pulling her son down with her — and then they both crawl into the far corner, hiding behind the chair that Clara's body is tied to.

  They can tell that he's still in the kitchen by the sounds of crashing pans and breaking dishes. Then everything goes quiet, and the only sound that can be heard is coming from the storm outside. After what seems like an eternity passes by, they finally hear the familiar footsteps once again, this time heading down the hall and into the bathroom across from the barricaded bedroom. They only stay in the bathroom briefly, but when they come out, they stand and stare at the bedroom door, their position in plain view of Sarah and Matt's sight. Its a man, that much is obvious, and when he first approaches the door and tries to open it, the rope around the handle does its job and keeps the door closed.

  Anybody with half a brain could tell with a quick glance how to remove the rope from the knob, but this guy doesn't seem capable of figuring it out. He tries again and again, each time growing more frustrated and angry, until eventually he begins throwing his fists against the door — but even then it stays shut. Its only when he begins walking away that his hand brushes against the rope, making it fall from the knob, and causing the door to open just a crack — but he either doesn't see it, or doesn't care, because he continues walking into the living room where Sarah and Matt are hiding. He turns toward the back door, then stops and looks around the room, sniffing the air like an animal. Then he continues on, messing with the doorknob for an absurd amount of time before finally getting the door open. As the door swings inside, a gust of wind catches it and smacks him in the face, nearly sending him to the floor. Once he regains his balance, he forces himself into the driving rain and leaves the door open behind him.

  Matt jumps up and runs across the room, then struggles to close the door against the storm. He sees the man standing just outside, staring in the direction of the ocean, the pine trees swaying violently in the wind. When he finally gets it closed and locked, he starts to run toward the front room, then stops when he hears his mom's voice.

  "Matt, don't bother locking the front door, he obviously has a key. You need to make sure the bedroom door is shut."

  For a moment he forgot that the bedroom was even open. "Can you see anything in the doorway?"

  "I can't see inside the room, but the hallway is empty."

  Matt creeps around the corner, his gun in
his hand once again, and then very carefully makes his way down the hall until he reaches the bedroom. He extends his hand to reattach the rope, and then takes a step back when he looks through the now open doorway.

  "Mom, you have to come here..."

  With the world feeling as though its literally spinning out of control, and the room too dark to see anything but vague shadows and outlines — Ben wakes up confused and in pain, scared to move his body even the slightest. The last thing he remembers is standing out on the street, trying to get away from Amanda, and then the two men that approached him, one of which he had hoped was his father. Closing his eyes again, he hears two male voices in the background, both of them sounding far off, as if they're in a tunnel.

  "Its only a matter of time before she finds out where we're at..."

  "She already knows — she's probably watching us right now."

  "Is she sick?"

  "I don't know, it seems hard to believe that a girl as young as she is could be that twisted all on her own. She doesn't look sick though."

  "What about the kid?"

  "I don't know, he was hit pretty hard."

  The voices stop for a minute, and then Ben suddenly feels a cold hand on his forehead. Without meaning to, he flinches, then tries to lie as perfectly still as possible, hoping they hadn't noticed.

  "He's awake."

  Ben listens as both men gather close to him, their breath feeling warm on his face.

  "Its okay, you're safe now. Nobody is going to hurt you."

  The voice sounds familiar. He opens his eyes slowly, still unable to make out much detail. He focuses on one of the men at his side, who he doesn't recognize, but he looks friendly enough. Then he hears the other man speak...

  "Ben, look at me..."

  Although his voice still sounds strange, he instantly knows that the other man is his dad — even without looking at him. He turns his head and smiles at Curtis, then closes his eyes again as the room begins to spin.